A rchive Date
[ 23-03-2003 ]
Category
[ International Relations ]
sub-Categoy
[ U.S ]
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[http://www.canoe.ca/Columnists/steward.html
War is easy. Can Bush pull off the peace?
By HARTLEY STEWARD -- Toronto Sun
March 23, 2003
Perhaps now - with the fighter planes aloft and the bombs falling - is not the best of times to begin to doubt President George W. Bush.
Oh, I don't doubt he is doing the right thing and, as much as he understands them, for the right reasons. His obvious and growing sense of confidence as he leads the United States to this moment of war has given some comfort, to be sure.
His resolve in the face of French and German condescension and criticism has been reassuring. He even managed to keep from breaking out in laughter at the self-serving and ridiculous moral posturing of Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. He has certainly looked more the leader than the politically bankrupt French President, Jacques Chirac. His cowboy swagger and undiplomatic style are not badly suited to the present circumstance of his presidency.
But the only justification for this war that has ever made any sense to me, I am beginning to think as Iraq suffers the might of the awesome U.S. war machine, will take more than a jutting American jaw and a thick skin.
As the war progresses, as the plan unfolds more or less as the president and his people told us it would, the more I wonder if Bush has the wherewithal to carry through on the dream of peace and democracy he teased us with scant weeks ago.
It is a breathtaking notion that, while easily dismissed as naive and unlikely, is one which resonated with me more than anything the president said to persuade the American people and, even more, world leaders, to join his crusade against Saddam Hussein. That may speak more to my naivete than anything else, but it is a noble notion and I would like very much to believe it is possible in some form or other.
A basic yearning
The theory is that the people of Iraq, despite the lack of democratic tradition in the area, yearn, like men and women everywhere, to be free. It is a yearning as basic to humankind as protecting one's children; as propagating the species. They will embrace the American soldiers in Basra and Baghdad as liberators. They will insist on a democratic form of government, aided and abetted by America. Thus will democracy be born in the Arab world.
Such a state will, in time and with the help of the rest of the world, serve as inspiration to the whole area. Dictators and ersatz Arab royal families will begin to feel the pressure from their people. The example of Iraq will be waved in their faces until they begin to address the issue of elected bodies and democratic systems.
The Islamic states which have proliferated across that area of the world will give way to parliamentary democracies and democratic republics.
Peace, never necessarily high on the dictatorial priority list, will enjoy a new popularity. Democracies, the Bush people insist, will be more motivated to negotiate a peaceful solution to the conflicts between Israel and her Arab neighbours. The change in attitude in the area, those who subscribe to the theory will tell you, will make the world a more peaceful and safer place. In this way will the U.S. defuse the Islamic terrorist movement. In this way will it make the world safer for future generations.
For sure, it is a particularly American vision. It is born of the indomitable American spirit. It's hard to imagine the French, jaded, cynical, world weary, buying into any part of it. Indeed, you can almost hear the snide chuckles and stifled guffaws in the corridors of the United Nations.
I'll admit it does not have the feeling of inevitability about it. It's more like the stuff of dreams and wishful thinking. I think that's because it's difficult to imagine George Bush, so self-assured in the run-up to this war, pulling off the hard part.
Difficult, even, to think the task would continue to occupy his mind after Saddam is gone and the troops are home.
The international diplomacy, the foreign arm twisting, the bribery and economic persuasion, is not the sort of stuff which affords a president the opportunity to make sexy political announcements wearing a stressed-leather bomber jacket. Already anticipating the politics of it all down the road, Bush announced a week ago: "We will be in Iraq as long as necessary, but not a minute longer." Which is a shame. I suspect the American people would have little difficulty understanding the vision, no matter how idealistic.
Idealism has never been a problem for Americans. After the current horrors on the nightly news, I think they would be damn proud of a president who took the war on terrorism in this direction, however difficult a process.
Steward appears Tuesdays and Sundays. E-mail: hartleysteward@canoemail.com
 World Fact Book (CIA)]
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